Just a dream
by thefudge is grumpy
Summary: AU. Takes place after 6x20. Kai is a witchpire, bent on getting his life source.


_(originally posted on tumblr.)_

* * *

**Just a dream**

Bonnie had been stung before. She remembered being six and terrified of wasps. The kids next door told her they had found a litter of kittens in a basket by the side of the road. She had gone after them with the unshakeable faith that people couldn't lie and that all she'd see was fluffy fur balls. Instead, one of the boys grabbed her arms and made her stand still as another boy brought a wasps's nest close to her face.

She sobbed and cried so hard that a bit of her magic leashed out, unbeknownst to her, and the nest was broken in half. When the angry insects shot out like tiny arrows, the boys dropped to the ground, cowering in fear. Bonnie was not fast enough. She hid her face, but she was stung before she could breathe. The pain was not really pain, but waves of needles that didn't let her move. They pinned her to the spot, wrapped her in a cocoon of stinging warmth. The outside world was melting.

That is how she felt now. Except, when she touched the spot between her breasts, it felt like a bite mark. Two small holes, the size of pins, the kind you stick on a bulletin board. She let her finger dwell there, on the blister, the flesh that had been newly torn.

Her head was pounding. It seemed as if she had forgotten everything she once knew. She was holding the pieces to an image outside her reach.

She rolled against the damp sheets. Feverish, but cold. And she realized, she was naked. Her chest was bare and there was one more bite mark. She felt it, right on the underside of her left breast. The saliva was half-dry. She shuddered with disgust. But her nipples were hard. That must have been the chill. All sensations came to her gradually.

_Where_ was she?

She tried to lift her head, but all she could see was a dark ceiling, the color of red wine. There was faint light coming from a window next to the bed. She stretched her neck to see what could be outside, but there was only a blue glow and…snow. White flecks melted against the pane.

The air was thick with blood and a sweet scent, pomegranates or currants. Her nostrils flared. It was still cold. But the sting warmed her. The sting kept her awake.

She let her hand travel down to her stomach. There, right above her pelvis. Another bite. Four holes, clustered together like a flower. Then, on the inside of her thigh…one big hole, steaming with fresh venom. And a gash…as if teeth had grazed through skin like nails. She shuddered and felt a spasm in her gut.

Bonnie jumped forward and crawled through the empty darkness.

Her feet hit the plywood floor. She skidded and stumbled across the room, muscles numb, movements unrehearsed. Behind her, snowflakes swirled in the corner of the window. They were trying to stick to her skin and turn her into ice. She ran out of the room into an even darker corridor. Her breath came out in large clouds of fog.

But she was desperately, devastatingly cold. Her arms clamped around her body in a futile effort to keep warm. Visions flurried past her eyes like the snowflakes in the window.

No. These shadows were real. Their motion was quick and ecstatic. Someone was running circles around her, narrowing her field of vision, making it harder to breathe.

"Stop!"

The shadow flicked past her, making her hair flutter. It left the ghost of a touch on her stomach. Bonnie whirled around, but the shadow was always a breath away. It seemed to be chasing her, but in fact, she was chasing _it_. She tried to catch it between her fingers, tried to grasp its essence, but it evaporated into thin air, every time.

Her head was swimming. She was going to heave. She turned and turned and turned…until she seemed to be _inside _the shadow.

And then, the motion stopped. All was quiet. Only her pulse knocked against her throat.

She sighed with relief. If she could reach a source of light – or the outside, she might be safe.

_Swoosh._

Fingers wrapped around her waist and she was sped into a door frame. Her head slammed against the wall.

"You left the bedroom…_naughty girl_."

The words cut right through her skin. Except, these were not words, but teeth. Sharp and long.

He sank the fangs into her throat.

The nest of wasps had been unleashed and she bent her head back into his shoulder and screamed.

No ordinary scream. A primeval howl from the time when she was a child and nothing mattered but her body and the sensations coursing through it.

The pieces of the image were coming together, and as she felt her blood pool into his eager mouth, her hand reached back and touched his face.

Her fingers scratched helplessly at the stubble of his jaw. She tore at his eyelids, wanting to scoop his eyes out, make him stop. But all she did was hold onto him better, as he pierced through each layer of skin. Her palm rested at the back of his head, pushing his fangs deeper inside.

Soon, she realized why she felt compelled to guide him. He was not depleting her of blood only. Her magic seemed to be flushing out of her too, in a wild, unbearable torrent of pleasure. When a witch used magic, she expelled the energy out of her essence. It was _supposed _to feel good. This was the same. Like casting spell after spell after spell….until you were empty and free.

He groaned and hummed against her skin and pulled her tighter in his arms, until her feet were off the ground and she was floating in a sea of blood.

"K-Kai."

* * *

She gasped and opened her eyes.

"Bonnie?"

The light was beaming directly in her eyes.

"Bonnie? Are you okay? I heard you screaming."

Matt Donovan's familiar features came into focus. He was towering over her figure with a look of pure concern. It was such a comfort, coming up from the dark to find him beside her, a beacon of light.

She was laid out on the sofa, a blanket thrown haphazardly over her legs.

Her mouth was dry and hot. She was parched. Her body was slow to grasp her surroundings. But the arched ceiling, the orange banner over the ornate fireplace…She was in the Salvatore boarding house.

"Yeah…I…it was just a dream."

She remembered now. She had been released from hospital after Damon fed her his blood. He had driven her back here. She must've fallen asleep.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, standing up with some difficulty.

"Just came to check on Elena. You might've heard…she took the cure."

Bonnie blinked in surprise. "She…did? How is she feeling?"

"Better than you, I imagine," Matt observed, wincing.

Bonnie gave a short laugh and touched the small scar at her throat. A reminder from Lily Salvatore that she should _not_ go easy on her next time.

And then…right above that fading scar, the sting. Two raw holes. Like pins on a bulletin board.

Bonnie rubbed the blisters. The wound was steaming fresh. She shook from head to toe.

"Bon…?"

Matt placed a hand on her shoulder. She jumped, as if startled from a trance.

"Wow…you're spooked."

"No. It's just that..Damon's blood is doing strange things to my head."

Her voice quaked. She was afraid to look at her body, afraid to find more stings.

"I'd better get you home. You need some rest."

* * *

"Are you sure you don't want me to spend the night? I don't mind sleeping on the couch," Matt insisted, as he walked her inside the house.

Bonnie emitted a short laugh. Her heart was pounding against her rib cage, making a violent surge to her throat.

"I'm fine. I'm not a _baby_. I've been attacked before. And fed vampire blood. It'll get out of my system soon."

Matt argued a bit longer, until she kissed him on the cheek and sent him on his way.

When the door was safely shut behind him, Bonnie bolted towards the basement.

She clambered down the steps shakily and reached for the light switch. The room was empty, except for the usual trinkets and boxes lying around uncoordinated on the floor.

She went to the back of the room, pushed her old bicycle out of the way, and started stacking the boxes against the wall. Then she bent down and carefully removed two bricks out of the plaster. She stretched her hand inside the hollow space and pulled out the remains of the Ascendant.

Bonnie heaved a sigh. She had not destroyed it. Not entirely.

At the time, she had told herself it was only safekeeping, in case it was needed again. A witch could not part with a magical object so easily.

…especially if that object held the lock to a door.

_Dear God._

She shuddered to think…

_Why didn't I destroy it? What was I hoping to…?_

Never mind that now. She was going to watch it burn. And throw away the key.

* * *

She drew a circle of salt on the living room floor. The candles shone like specters against the wall, making dancing figures out of shadows. The air was charged with electricity, sparking in the darkest corners of the room. She knelt down and placed the Ascendant in the middle of the circle.

In a matter of minutes, it was done. The chant rose into the air, along with the burning incense.

She had destroyed it for good. This time.

Imagine if she had let it rot in her basement wall. Like a shameful secret.

Bonnie chastised herself bitterly. _Never make this mistake again._

* * *

Half-asleep in her bed, she wondered if Damon's blood had clouded her mind, if maybe she had turned her nemesis into her friend. Why else would Kai hatch fangs in her dream? Why would he be a vampire?

Witches cannot be undead. They are earth and sap and all things living.

But Malachai…he was neither. He thrived in a middle place, not dead, not living.

He was never coming back now. She had destroyed the last piece of him. Bonnie put a hand against her throat. The little holes were gone, filled up again with clean flesh.

Her hands fluttered lazily against her chest. She touched the spot between her breasts. No bite mark. Her left breast, she weighed listlessly in her palm. It was untouched.

…_was just a dream._

She sighed and stretched her head against her pillow. The air smelled sweet, like pomegranates or currants.

_Must be the burning incense…the Ascendant is gone…_

She was cold. She wanted to pull the blanket over her body, but sleep weighed heavily on her limbs. A blue glow was coming from the window. She saw snowflakes melt against the pane. She closed her eyes drowsily.

"You know, I meant it when I said you have nice palms."

Bonnie snapped her eyes open. He was holding her hands captive. And his eyes were red, rimmed with veins like dark tendrils. Her fingers could touch his fangs. They were long and smooth and brand new.

"Oh, Bon. It's like no time has passed at all," he breathed into her open palm.

"N-no. This is just a dream. This is a dream," Bonnie croaked, tensing against his very real, very solid body.

"But you didn't destroy the Ascendant the first time. _Naughty girl_."

Bonnie closed her eyes in revulsion. She was six and the wasps' nest was right in front of her face. And it was hard to admit this, even now, more than a decade later. But she had _loved_ it. She had loved being so close to it. She had felt a thrill like no other.

He raised her hands above her head.

"We have so much catching up to do."

His voice was different, lower, filled with infinite hunger. She couldn't stop staring at his red eyes.

"I'll tell you all about my _wonderful_ new appetite."

She flinched away from him, but there was nowhere else to go.

"You're right. I talk too much. I'm _that_ guy. That guy that won't shut up."

He bent down and rested the tip of his fangs in the spot between her breasts. He was grinning up at her.

"So why don't I show you?"

It was nothing like the dream. But no dream is alike.

Bonnie arched her body into his mouth before he pierced the first layer of skin. It was like casting her first _phasmatos_. This is the way a witch perished; giving up her power just to feel it leave her body. He drank her magic, her blood and her life source. He kissed and bit every inch of her, his venom marking her again and again and again.

And when he'd had enough, he didn't have the power to stop.

And the horrible thing was, she didn't want him to.


End file.
